Quake: The Counterattack
by dsm09
Summary: This is a semiretelling of the Quake 1 story with more depth and heavily inspired by Doom 3. It is not completely faithful to the game. Consider yourself warned Quake fans. Rated M for strong language and gore.
1. Chapter 1: Desperate Measures

**Quake: Operation Counter Strike**

The weathered military transport chopper, circled around a couple times before it touched down on the landing pad.

I stood in the opened bulkhead door, eyes narrowed to avoid sand dust in my eyes. The time was 0530 hours and the year was 2414. The last ninety minutes had been hectic. They had woken me up at 4 am with a dubious phone call and asked me to report for duty. I had obliged halfway asleep and half and hour later, I was at the barracks were my C.O. had dragged me to a ready transport helicopter.

Now it touched down at a remote facility of sorts way out in the desert. I didn't know much of this base sans that it was supposedly built in a place where there had once been a bustling city before the apocalypse in the 22nd century. The apocalypse had turned a lot of US soil into wasteland and the once mighty country of the USA wound up fighting for survival along with everyone else.

Today, the world was governed by a central Earth Government that consisted of a major council known as the Federal Coalition of Man, but it still happened that factions broke out of the FCM and waged war against the interests of the Coalition.

As the rotors slowed down, I leapt off the chopper. A young, slightly nervous marine approached me.

"Sorry Captain Sir, but I need to see your file before I can let you in."

Scowling mildly and without a word, I handed the marine my personal Field Assistant – a small electronic notebook device that also contained my personal data. The marine looked it over carefully, seemingly afraid to make mistakes. He was evidently pretty green and lacked experience. Finally he handed it back to me.

"Looks all right Sir, now if you would please follow me."

He turned and began walking and I followed him calmly.

On each side of the bulkhead door stood a pair of tough looking marines, who eyed me suspiciously at first, but then it was as if they realized something about my purpose here and took their minds off of me again, searching for somebody else to turn their suspicious eyes on no doubt.

They were both armed with deadly Perforator flechette guns, so it was clear to me that this installation held a very important military secret.

The young marine led me through a couple of doors and took me for an extended elevator ride until we finally arrived at a heavily guarded place. I assumed it was the Command H.Q. of the military presence on this base.

"Please step inside Sir, General Blake is eager to speak with you."

I stepped forward and the door slid open to reveal a conference room that was now occupied by three gentlemen in battle outfit.

"Welcome to Facility Foxtrot-zero-niner, Ranger!"

The General was a weather-beaten fellow with close-shaven, grayish hair and a short moustache. I had served under him a lot of times before. He himself was a veteran of many campaigns.

"Thanks Sir," I responded, glad to see a well-known face again. I was about to ask him what the drill was, when the General introduced me to the two other men.

"This is Lieutenant Colonel Manning, who's the actual Post Commander of this outfit," Blake told me, gesturing to a stately looking officer who looked like the polite kind of gentleman with his well-shaven, clean face.

"...and this is Colonel Bradshaw, who will be your superior in this operation."

I looked at the Colonel. He was a stern-looking officer, wrinkle-faced and stiff. He looked like he had a stick up his ass and there was a slight hint of vanity in his eyes. My first time impression of this guy was not a good one.

I saluted both gentlemen and put my butt to the seat offered to me.

"We've got ourselves a nasty situation here Ranger," Blake began.

"It's about this Slipgate Device, you see..."

Colonel Bradshaw cut in.

"Our research team is close to perfecting a revolutionary new technology nicknamed 'Slipgates'. Once we perfect these, we'll be able to transport people and cargo from one place to another instantly – I'm sure you can imagine what a tactical advantage that will give us!"

I whistled.

"Unfortunately, someone has beaten us to it already," Blake resumed.

Colonel Bradshaw briefly scowled at the General, but collected himself. Manning picked up the thread.

"Someone has gotten their hands on one of our slipgates through means unknown to us and is somehow able to use it to insert death squads inside our bases to kill, steal and kidnap. We don't know how they go about doing it, but we've had a number of locations of this base hit by this enemy. The pattern is always the same: The place houses a Slipgate. We lose contact with the area and by the time reinforcements arrive, all science personnel lie dead, the security guard detail assigned to that area gone without a trace and a great amount of equipment has vanished along with the slipgate housed in that area. So far, we've lost five out of ten slipgates."

"The Hell of it is we have no idea where the bastard's from. The eggheads have scrutinized the signal patterns recorded by the slipgate computers and found out that we're dealing with an enemy they think is not from Earth, but another dimension. We're preparing a massive counter offensive and you're in charge! This is operation Counter Strike and your orders are to find this... enemy and stop him...or it!"

Blake looked at me gravely as he spoke.

"You're our best man. The soldier best qualified for the job based on the info the eggheads have found about this...other dimension."

Lieutenant Colonel Manning rose from his seat.

"Your men have been hand picked among the finest veteran troops and I am informed that you have fought alongside several of them before. They will follow you unquestioningly. They are currently gearing up and preparing for battle in their barracks."

"We're only waiting for additional weapons and supplies...and of course for you to get your bearings," Bradshaw added coldly. "I suggest you better get acquainted with this facility and start planning your means of advance. I'll have Sergeant Smithers show you to the Facility System Surveillance Room where you can get a detailed view of the base layout."

"Colonel, are you sure that's necessary?" Manning cut in. "All we need is to get our men to the other side and..."

"To efficiently direct a military advance, it is important to keep your back covered and keep an eye on supply lines," Bradshaw interrupted coldly. The two officers eyed each other with ice in their eyes.

General Blake cut in.

"You will need to launch this attack soon, Captain, or the enemy, whom we have codenamed "Quake", will become suspicious and prepare himself. For now, I suggest you do as Bradshaw says – he's an experienced strategist and knows what he's talking about. Dismissed."

And so I left, both confused and determined. Somehow, I wished I had been given more details on what exactly these slipgates did and how they worked. Why they had given the enemy this strange out-of-the-blue codename was beyond me, but for now, I didn't consider it all too important.

Outside, Sergeant Smithers was waiting for me. He was a jovial character, a bit of a joker even, but one glance told me he knew how to take care of himself. The scar on his face gave him a slight disfigured, permanent grin, which somehow fitted his character remarkably.

"So you got the lowdown, eh Sir?"

I nodded, already thinking about the upcoming strike. I was both apprehensive and eager to engage in combat again, but I was unsure about what I was going to face.

"Here Sir," Smithers said, brandishing a basic combat shotgun in my direction.

"It's best to stay armed at all times around here, because you never know what might happen."

I took the weapon and let out a muffled "thanks".

The shotgun was a standard issue assault piece. Ever since civilization returned to Earth, it had been the standard armament for infantry troops. It was cheap to produce and fairly effective. Reliant bullet weapons were harder to produce these days, where military equipment was made from salvaged and recycled materials, so military forces had gone an alternate route with military arms, slapping together the crude, but adequate flechette guns – machineguns that fired nail projectiles, technically termed 'flechettes', that would splinter on impact and cause massive damage to armor. But because of slow projectile speeds, those were only decent at close quarters and the military outfitted its soldiers with shotguns as their all-purpose weapons instead.

The current type of shotguns had a remarkable range, were automatic and kept the pelting narrow, making it decently useful for ranged takedowns. However, it was not very effective against armor.

-

The System Surveillance Room was a darkened room with consoles all over. There was a scientist inside the room, busy checking the equipment but he turned to greet us when we arrived.

He pointed to a big screen that displayed a map of the entire facility.

"Ok," he began after a brief introduction. "The glowing yellow spots you see are the location marks for each of the slipgates – as you can see, they're kept rather close to one another. This is because the slipgates are still underdeveloped and unable to transport things very far at present."

"And yet these things can reach into another dimension I hear?" I responded thoughtfully.

"Yes..." the scientist began, looking for words.

"It's difficult to explain exactly how it is, but the other dimension is both far away and... right here."

"How did you figure out that the other dimension was in fact another dimension?" I asked curiously.

No response.

"Sir?" I asked irritably.

The scientist just stared at the screen.

"Mother of God..." he whispered.


	2. Chapter 2: Chaos Unleashed

The scientist' expression had changed to one of utter disbelief and horror.

I followed his gaze and saw that that the slipgate markers on the map had turned an angry red color.

"The slipgates are active!" the scientist whispered. "But how...?"

I turned to Smithers.

"Sergeant, get my men assembled and move out on the double, we..."

There was a blinding flash right were Smithers was standing, and bright light seemed to explode from the insides of Smithers' body. There was a loud whizzing sound and before I knew it, smithers' body exploded into chunky pieces of flesh, bone shards and entrails, painting the nearby consoles with the grisly crimson paint of blood.

Instead of the soldier, I saw a figure materialize itself right where the Sergeant had been standing. The figure started out translucent, but gradually faded into focus, shaping itself into a strange, humanoid creature that looked like some freak out of medieval times wearing knight's armor and carrying a double-bladed hatchet.

The 'knight' seemed to double over as the light faded away as if its materialization had taken some kind of toll on it, but then it rose to its full height, looked around briefly and let out a strange cry in some absurd language.

It spotted the whimpering scientist first and its reaction was prompt. With a quick leap forward, it swung its small combat axe in an arc and decapitated the screaming egghead, whose bald head sailed through the air with a ludicrous expression frozen on its face, before it smacked against a rusty steel wall with a wet thud. Then the creature turned and spotted me.

I knew his much about medieval knights: their armor became useless once guns were invented, not like modern day infantry armor that could effectively reduce the damage a projectile would dish out, so with this in mind, I overcame my initial shock.

I quickly brought up my shotgun and fired, feeling a strange, wicked excitement as the gun's butt kicked back against my shoulder.

The strange knight let out a grunt of pain, but it was still standing and the shotgun didn't seem to have dealt that much damage to it or even its armor.

"Aw crap," I muttered as the knight lunged. I fired again, but the enemy still didn't stop. It was close now. It brought its axe down hard towards me, but I grabbed its armored wrist, stemmed my left foot on its plate-armored belly and rolled backwards onto the floor, pulling the creature with me and then, using its own momentum against it, combined with a powerful push from my boot, I sent it flying straight into a bunch of computer consoles.

The knight smashed hard into the consoles, sending sparks showering everywhere. I rolled onto my feet, grabbing the shotgun and fired off two shots at the monster while it tried to regain its bearings. The second shot brought the creature down.

Examining the corpse, I found that it was human, but with some strange, non-human traits about it. Through its helmet visor, I could see its eyes that were milky white and its unprotected mouth was set in a ghastly snarl. The armor looked primitive and medieval enough, but there was some kind of inexplicable 'aura' about it.

I yanked its battle hatchet from its gauntleted hand. It was a compact, fairly light little axe, but remarkably solid and sharp. This thing could seriously damage even modern armor and made manmade axes from medieval times seem like pure rubbish. I decided to commandeer the axe. It was small enough to allow me to carry it in my belt.

And now I became conscious to the panicked radio chatter. There was literally a war going on inside this facility. I heard men yelling orders and situation reports over the clattering of gunfire.

"_Dammit, those things are coming out of nowhere, fall back to the barracks!" _A Sergeant barked over the radio. I heard more reports like it and I gathered that the troops were assembling at the barracks. I hadn't been given the radio frequencies yet so I had no means of contacting my men per radio, so I had to make my way to the barracks to take direct charge of my men and drive this invasion back.

Exiting the System Surveillance Room, I ran into a couple guys with a bad attitude. They looked like regular soldiers, but they had the same milky white eyes and a ghastly grin on their faces as that 'knight' guy and their combat suits were bloodstained. Additionally, they sounded like animals, snarling almost delightfully at me when they spotted me.

However, they weren't very bright and seemed to disregard military training, so they fell easily enough before me. I rummaged through their backpacks, and emptied their shotguns for ammo.

I remembered that the top brass had told me about the unknown enemy kidnapping the military security force. I reckoned that they had been turned into these maniacs and sent back against us.

First order of business was to get to the nearest armory. It didn't take me long to find one and I was lucky enough to find some combat armor and a rapid fire nailgun along with several shells. Thus armed, my battle continued.

This area appeared to be dominated largely by these "goonified" soldiers, Rottweiler dogs similarly infected with bloodlust and M.P. Enforcers also turned into maniac killers, but judging from the frequent radio reports, my men were up against more and far more diabolical creatures like the knight whose hatchet I had taken over.

I entered a communications room that was being ravaged by insane Enforcers. I sent a deadly hail of razor sharp flechettes at them, mowing one of them down. The others returned fire, sending red hot stun blasts in my direction.

I didn't want to get hit by one of those blasts; a hit would not only be painful, but weaken my muscles and my mind, slowing me down and making me easier to subdue and if these guys were allowed to apprehend me, they'd turn me into one of those maniac killers for sure, though I didn't know how they went about doing that yet.

My aim and reflexes were better than theirs and they soon lay perforated at my feet. Then it dawned on me that perhaps I could contact my troops from this communications room.

I tried several buttons until I got in touch with somebody, that somebody being none other than Colonel Bradshaw.

"_Ranger! Thank God you're still alive!"_ he exclaimed, his relief seemed genuine, but I still had little respect for this guy, so I responded rather gruffly.

"Sir with respect, we don't have time for this – I need the radio frequencies to establish radio contact with my men. What are they? Over." There was a pause at the other end.

"_I...haven't got those frequencies. The Counter Strike operatives have not yet been given over to my command officially."_

"Great, who has them Sir?"

"_General Blake was supposed to have given me all radio frequencies for this op, but I haven't seen him since the briefing. Lieutenant Colonel Manning suggested we waited for the last moment, to prevent that the info got leaked."_

"Do you have any idea where General Blake is, Sir?"

"_I don't know, but we better maintain this comm. link. I'm still at Command HQ. and I've got a fix on your location and now your radio personal frequency from here. Your men are still holding out at the barracks, get to them asap."_

I could hear that the Colonel was regaining control over his shaken nerves and was now back in the commanding role.

"Orders understood Sir, what's the quickest route?"

"_You need to go through the medical labs – it's right before the barracks, now don't waste anymore time soldier. Out."_

I did as I was told. I didn't feel like I had much choice anyway.

The medical bay was filled with aging, but useful diagnosis systems and medical supplies. It also had a bunch of rude guys who wanted to keep me from the barracks, but they went down quickly. I don't react well to rude behavior.

I was moving stealthily through a darkened infirmary. The sounds of battle now reached my ears. It sounded pretty heated.

_Hang in there boys, I'll be there soon!_

A wall literally exploded somewhere behind me, sending concrete and glass all over the place. I wheeled around in time to see a huge figure stomp put from a smoking hole in a wall.

This thing was definitely not human although it had many similarities. It was taller and much broader than even the biggest man I had ever seen, had broad, pointy shoulders and bared arms which were incredibly muscular. It wore what looked like a solid brown leather apron with a strange rune on it. Its head was bald and its face distorted in its ugliness with small, beady eyes staring at me with a wild, ferocious look. It pulled its lips back in a feral snarl, revealing filthy, ugly, misshapen teeth.

But the thing that really caught my attention was that his right hand was cut off and in its place was attached a rusty old chainsaw. In its other hand, it held a large handgun of sorts; a kind of primitive grenade launcher that was too big for a man to wield one-handed, but appropriate enough for this brute.

The creature roared at me, revved up its chainsaw and stormed towards me with its chainsaw raised above its head. I brought up the nailgun and started hammering nails into it.

The nails ripped into the monster and it let out an inhuman cry of pain. The first burst made it stumble and fall backwards, but it quickly got up again and attacked more aggressively this time.

My second burst failed to stop it and it swung its chainsaw at me in a wide arc.

I had good reflexes and avoided death this time, but the chainsaw managed to cut through my side and ripped a nasty gash into my torso.

I winced, but forced myself to continue and pumped more nails into the beast and backing away from its wildly flailing chainsaw attacks until it fell over and died. Its heavy body landed with a thud that shook the floor.

I kicked the body in the side, but immediately regretted it as I felt a sharp pain where I had been cut.

I looked around and found a few medkits. I patched myself up with the supplies from one of the medkits, injected some painkillers and pretty soon felt strong and kicking again, so that I could continue my mission.

-

"Oh fuck me!"

I had just exited the medical labs only to find my entry into the barracks blocked by fallen rubble.

I had scoured the area for another entry but there was no other way inside. I could hear my men fighting for their lives somewhere inside the barracks complex and here I was, unable to reach them.

"Colonel Bradshaw Sir, this is Ranger, do you copy" I said tersely into my helmet radio. I had recorded the frequency that the Colonel had called me up on before.

"_Copy Ranger, what is it?"_

"I suggest you look at your screen and detect my position – that should answer your question, Sir, over," I replied almost sarcastically.

"_Oh shit,"_ he just responded. He had evidently found the blockade on his little tracker.

"Yep, no way to get in, what are your orders? Over." There was a pause.

"_Reinforcements are out of the question, we're cut off from the outside world. Damn, this Quake bastard works fast. He heard about Operation Counterstrike and hit first! And he did a thorough job at that."_

Suddenly the radio clicked and I heard the voice of Manning.

"_Ranger, this is Lieutenant Colonel Manning here, we need to hold the fort whatever the cost. I need you to go and set up some automated turrets near key strategic areas. First and foremost our sewage treatment facility – the bastards can take shortcuts to key locations from that place from where they can manipulate with the facility and definitely fuck us and the rest of the base up bad. You gotta seal off any inlet and outlet there, you got that soldier? Over."_

"Affirmative! How do I get there? Over."

"_There's an entry to the science installation from medical. Go through there, then you'll wind up at Sewage Treatment. Out."_

I stared back in the direction of the barracks. I didn't like leaving my men behind, but I had no choice.

This was gonna be unpleasant. With my jaw set, I set my eyes upon the Sewage Treatment Facility and went on my way.


	3. Chapter 3: En route

The Science Facility was really trashed up bad. The place housed a lot of computers, but they were all smashed up it seemed. Almost as if the enemy forces didn't want me to know something. Something stored on these computers.

That's when I heard a sudden noise mixed with the panicked cry for help. Someone was being attacked and I distinctly heard the terrible noise of chainsaws grinding against metal. I rushed towards the sound and rounding a corner I saw two of those chainsaw wielding "ogres" or whatever they were, trying to cut down a sealed door.

I introduced them to a swarm of flechettes and they soon lay dead.

The door was unlocked and a scientist peered out at me. He was relieved to see me and waved me inside.

Inside was an office, but it was a mess of papers right now.

"I am most grateful for your help Mr... I would not have been able to escape this ordeal had you not shown up," he told me in a slightly quivering voice.

"I don't think it will matter in the long run buddy, they'll get you sooner or later if you don't get a gun." It was rather brutal of me to say that, but then, cordiality had never been one of my strong sides.

He looked pale and suddenly paranoid, but what he then said was unexpected.

"My life doesn't matter unless I can give it to save the rest of humanity. All our lives are expendable in this endeavour."

I paused.

"Well, you're a scientist, that means you know stuff. I need to know the origin of these critters. How this shit started. Tell me about those darn slipgates – how did you invent them? How come aliens are coming through them?"

The scientist fidgeted, unsure of what to say. He was afraid to tell me everything for some reason.

"The slipgates are able to create a passage across dimensions as a shortcut for us. What is a long distance here on Earth might be the exact same coordinates in another dimension. It…" He paused and then apparently decided to get to the point right away.

"We found that we had pierced into another, possibly inhabited dimension at some point during testing. We became excited and decided to explore this other dimension, but we never got a chance to. They...the enemy hit us suddenly."

I scowled, pondering at this.

"We were preparing an expedition, when we suddenly lost contact with the expedition members even before we were ready to send them – we lost contact with the entire Slipgate 09 sector. When the soldiers went in, they reported terrible sights. All science personnel killed, equipment gone and the slipgate in that sector vanished without a trace. Even the soldiers assigned to guard that sector were gone – no sign of them."

I was growing impatient.

"Ok, so you actually saw the dimension first?"

"No, we never got a chance to, but the data readings on the coordinates strongly suggested it."

He went on with his tale. "We suffered other such attacks – they always came without warning, only once did reinforcements show up in time to catch them in the act. They arrived in time to see strange disfigured soldiers walk about ensuring that there were no witnesses...killing the science personnel off as the newly arrived soldiers watched. The troops opened fire and managed to kill the remaining murderers. One of them was only wounded...they tried to interrogate him...or it, but it would only blabber nonsense. When they decided to kill it off, it seemed to suddenly, briefly snap to attention and speak – almost as if it regained some of its former sanity."

"So what did this...'grunt' say?" I asked, getting a little more interested.

"It said something about 'the Master' a being it referred to as 'Quake'. Then it became ferocious and they had to kill it. But an autopsy of the fellow revealed something else."

"What?"

"The madman was one of the missing soldiers, but someone or something had inserted a probe of some kind into the pleasure centers of his brain. This would make the soldier gain immense pleasure from killing – so much in fact that he would forget anything about morals and ethics, be reduced to a brutish animal bent on killing."

I thought out loud.

"That suggests that the bastard knows a thing or two about technology and he has stolen some of our tech – that means the bastard will use it against us. Thanks for the tip egghead," I grunted.

"That's not all. We were able to activate a slipgate system scan before the last enemies disappeared with it. The data that the scan brought back suggested massive movements on the other side and..."

He paused, swallowing hard.

"...The signatures were not human, but the movements suggested organized troop movements. We concluded that this 'Quake' was preparing to unleash its real army which was not human."

There was silence for a while as I pondered this. "Well, I guess you'd better come with me if you wanna live," I told him, hoisting my Nailgun.

"I'll only slow you down, but I wish you luck."

"Thanks," I grunted as I left him in his office and went ahead.

My ears picked up the sounds of combat and I automatically started into a run. Bursting into a room with my nailgun up, I arrived to see a brave soldier fighting for his life against one of those brutish 'ogre' creatures.

The soldier blasted the monster in the face with a double-barreled combat shotgun, sending the monster reeling to the floor, but it wasn't quite dead. The human raised his shotgun again, but before I could react to help him, a Doberman leapt out of the shadows behind the marine and bit onto his arm, yanking his shotgun off target as he fired.

The soldier punched the vicious dog, but it hung onto his arm. With an angry growl, the downed 'ogre' swung its chainsaw upward towards the marine, who was too preoccupied with the dog to be able to react in time.

The chainsaw cut him and the Doberman in half, just as I opened fire on the monster. The torso of the unfortunate soldier sailed through the air, making some kind of wicked summersault, spraying blood and other bodily fluids all across the room, while his legs and pelvis collapsed to the floor in a sticky crimson heap, coloring camouflage pants dark red.

The place was a mess consisting of the remains of the soldier. His face frozen in agony and the belly reduced to a gory mess of shriveled flesh. As a combat veteran, I was no stranger to grisly sights like this. In the end, you become immune to gross imagery and I only gave the dead marine a short look before I turned my attention to the double-barreled shotgun.

After a moment's thought, I decided to keep my basic shotgun, but trade the nailgun for the twin-barrel shotgun. It made sense, because it required me to keep only one ammo type, and the shotguns were both less cumbersome than the broad nailgun.

…


	4. Chapter 4: KneeDeep in Shit

The entrance to the Sewage Treatment Facility gave me a foretaste of what was waiting for me – a disgusting odor.

"Suck it up marine," I told myself and went in.

I had only gone a few more steps when an explosion ripped through the ceiling ahead of me, sending rubble down. The rubble filled up the hallway, impeding my progress.

Looking around, I found a grate I could remove. Looking through the grate, I could see filthy water far down.

"Ugh..."

But a quick glance around told me that there was no other way. I removed the grating and leapt down.

I plummeted into the water and went down. The stench and feel of the water thoroughly nauseated me, but when I got out of the water again, the surrounding stench didn't feel as bad anymore.

"I need a bath...a fucking _clean_ bath!"

A stun blast exploded against the wall right next to me, making me dive for cover. I heard the loud, aggressive breathing of the Enforcer – a strange sound, metallic and synthesized through its breather.

I waited for him. I heard his footsteps as he came rushing for me and when the right moment came, I leapt out and blasted him up close with the twin barreled shotgun. Luckily, this weapon was designed to function even when wet and filthy and it barked satisfyingly enough. The blast ripped the Enforcer's armor vest apart, but the bastard had survived. I rolled aside as it sent a blast right over my head. Landing back on my feet, I fired up at it from my crouching position and the M.P. was thrown to the ground by the blast, its synthesized scream echoing throughout the filthy pipes and hallways.

The commotion had alerted others and they came charging in my direction, but using the large pipe tunnels to my advantage, I outmaneuvered and ultimately outgunned each individual.

I had to find the valve controls and seal off every valve or pipe in this facility.

But Fate had other plans for me.

As I trudged through the filth, my radio suddenly clicked on.

"_...fuck outta there!"_

It was the voice of General Blake, he sounded agitated.

"Come again Sir?" I asked into my helmet microphone.

"_Ranger, it's a fucking trap – get the Hell outta that Sewage Treatment Plant, now goddammit, now, now, now!"_

I knew the General well enough to know his judgment was sound, I turned and ran as fast as I could, looking for a way out of this filthy sewer.

I came into a large filtration room with a pool of filthy water and several large valves leading out. But as I watched, grates started to close off the valves one by one. I had to react quickly.

I dashed for a valve that was not even beginning to seal off, but gunfire suddenly opened up around me. The air started to rain with buckshot and stun blasts. I zigzagged my way over to the valve.

Grating started to slowly lower in front of the valve. I had to make it, but the valve seemed so far away.

Something slammed into the lower side of my back with a terrible force, causing me to wince in pain. I swayed, but managed to stay upright. It hurt like Hell and I knew that I had caught buckshot. Luckily, my armor had absorbed it, otherwise I could have been seriously wounded and I was lucky that it was quality combat armor and not a shitty low-duty vest.

I was getting close now, but the valve was also halfway sealed off now.

And then another sharp pang of pain. This time it felt hot and I heard a loud crackle.

_Stun blast! Shit!_

Already, I felt that I weighed twice as much as I did. My head felt heavy and my vision blurred.

_Must...reach...it – move it you fucking lowlife piece of puke or you die!_

I threw myself towards the valve in desperation. It was a clumsy leap, and I rolled onto the floor in a clumsy, chaotic fashion. Completely distanced, I felt the pain of my limbs hitting solid surfaces, but the pain didn't seem real, almost as if it didn't actually hurt. There was another pang of pain and yet another, but I didn't care. My will was all that kept me going now. I came to a standstill and the world stopped spinning madly around me.

When I looked up, I was inside the valve, effectively separated from my enemies by a solid wall of grating with small meshes.

I could hear them snarl in frustration.

I felt too weak to carry on, I had to rest. I realized that I had probably been hit by more than one stun blast, otherwise my recovery would have begun now. I couldn't think clearly anymore and I suddenly didn't care.

I barely registered that strong arms grabbed me, and started dragging me through the valve.


	5. Chapter 5: Crisis Meeting

"...out of your mind! It's suicide!"

The angry voice of Colonel Bradshaw was the first touch of reality I felt. Then a rising sense of aching in most of my body. I began to feel the smell of oil and metal and sensed the stale air of the base.

"Listen Colonel, we're outta options here. We've no choice!" General Blake's welcome voice met my ears as the darkness lifted from my eyes and a crazy blur swam before my eyes.

My senses were slowly coming back, but I couldn't remember what had happened. The last I remembered was the overpowering stench of crud and hearing Blake's voice over the radio – something about a trap?

I groaned and the blur began to focus itself. I found myself in a rudimentary infirmary inside a cleaner section of the base.

"Well, well, looks like your little soldier hero has woken up!" Bradshaw's voice cut sarcastically through the air.

"What the Heck happened?" I asked groggily.

Blake approached me, he was limping slightly and blood spatter in his side showed that he had been wounded, however, he had obviously been treating himself of the wound so it was evidently not as bad as it had been.

"I was able to get your sorry excuse of a soldier's ass outta the Sewage Treatment Facility, since you had to go and fall into a trap," he smiled wearily.

"You had taken several stun blast hits, and you also got some buckshot into your body, so it was no small wonder you ended up unconscious," Bradshaw added, a little more friendly this time, apparently regretting his cold outburst before.

"It's a miracle you survived, Captain. You had suffered some heavy blood loss from buckshot hits. Good thing you had that quality armor or you'd have been dead fer sure," Blake told me.

"All right, so what are your orders, Sir? What are we gonna do now?"

"That's what we're discussing right now, but first I'd like to ask: What were you doing at Sewage Treatment?"

"Why, Lieutenant Colonel Manning ordered me there! Said I needed to seal any inlet and outlet to prevent the beasts from further infiltrating the base," I responded puzzled. My mind was still swimming and I wasn't quite able to think clearly.

"Oh he did, did he?" Blake asked, his voice lowered to a hoarse whisper that barely contained his suppressed anger.

"It would seem that the good Lieutenant Colonel Manning thinks a bit too highly about his own judgment to just order our men about without our council," Bradshaw added coldly.

General Blake, eyed him briefly, his eyes narrowed to two, thin lines in his ragged face.

"Acting without council of superior officers can be forgivable in certain situations if the situation call for it, but it seems that our 'dear' Manning didn't have our best intentions in mind."

"You mean... Manning's a traitor?"

"Isn't it obvious? Though it beats me why he would turn on us. These creatures evidently wish to destroy us – he's read all the reports. Why would he try to stop us, why would he side with _them_?"

"All I know is that he's got a good deal to answer for...when I find him!" I snarled, suddenly entering the little conversation between my superiors.

"We'll have to stop Quake first," Bradshaw grunted.

"No," Blake responded flatly.

"No?"

"No!"

Bradshaw stared bewildered at his superior, but Blake began to speak before the Colonel could open his mouth.

"If Manning is indeed a traitor, then we must stop him first. He can do much harm to any attempt on our part to stop Quake. There's no telling how much damage he can do with his influence. We must find him and ascertain that he truly intended to betray Ranger."

"Yeah, even if it means beating him to a bloody pulp to get the answers outta him," I gruffed, slamming my right fist into my left palm.

"We don't know where he is," Bradshaw retorted. "The man could be anywhere, and maybe he doesn't know that Ranger is still alive. We could use that to our advantage, maybe even lure him out of the dark."

Blake and I looked at each other. There was a hint of a smile in Blake's mouth.

"Not a bad proposal, Colonel, I'm inclined to agree."

"I'm still not comfortable about you assaulting the slipgate directly General, we need you to command the troops… those that are still alive,"

_Assault the slipgates directly? _I thought. My mind was beginning to clear.

"Colonel, we need a distraction. I'm only going to confuse them, while you and Ranger reestablish communications and send for reinforcements."

"Hold on! Hold on!" I interrupted with some slight irritation. Both Senior Officers looked at me.

"You mean to tell me that you, a General, are going to assault the Slipgates directly?"

Blake eyed me, his expression was grim.

"Listen son, I may be nearing old age, but I still know how to kick ass. And a General without an army is useless, so I'm gonna take the mantle of assault trooper…"

"But you _have_ an army, Sir," I responded hotly. Blake looked at me with suspicion in his eyes.

"You have _me_, and if you and the Colonel send for reinforcements, you'll be in a better position to assume command of a larger army than if you've gone and got yourself killed and you'll be a useful General with a proper army with which you can kick this filth back into the Abyss or wherever these bastards came from."

Blake hesitated, looking from me to Colonel Bradshaw. The Colonel nodded, I thought I saw a slight smile on the Colonel's face.

"The kid's right General, Ranger's trained for frontal assaults, but we need you here to command the forces against Quake."

Blake stared grimly at me for a second, then he suddenly grinned. "See? Now this is the reason I've put such trust into you, Captain. I always knew you held potential. All right, you fake an assault on the Slipgates and while those bastards are occupied with you, Bradshaw and I will head for communications and get some reinforcements to help our beleaguered men as well as try and get a bead on Manning's location. I'd greatly prefer to do the bastard first, but we gotta take what we can get. The situation is too much out of control for now."

I stared past the General, unsmiling.

"I'm prepared to take the battle to their freakin' homeworld if I have to. I've a feeling this Quake's got enough up his sleeve to take care of eventual reinforcements. This is a unique opportunity to hit him where it hurts, while he's occupied.

The General's smile faded, but he nodded without a word.

I grabbed my double-barreled shotgun that Blake had salvaged from the Sewage Treatment Plant and took stock of my ammo. It wasn't much, but I was confident that I'd find still more within the base, before I made my excursion to the other side.

As I hoisted my equipment and started for the door, I stopped and turned halfway around, addressing the two officers.

"Give my regards to Manning if you see him and make it a good one!"

As I exited the makeshift infirmary and heard the General mumble: "You bet soldier, don't worry..."

…


End file.
